[00:00:00] Lori: we're never just the corporate version of ourselves or the motherly, wifely, or female version of ourselves. We're one body, one person. And so how do we show up as our whole self and bring our whole self with us to the best of our ability on any given day or any given meeting, and be true to that?
[00:00:21] Aneta: We often hear people wishing us a long, happy, and healthy life, but what if the length isn't what matters most? What if instead, it's the breath depth and purpose of each day that matters most? Welcome to the Live the Width of Your Life podcast. My name is Aneta Ardelian Kuzma and join me weekly as I interview guests who made changes in their own lives to live more fully with intention, gratitude, and joy. Be prepared to be inspired by their stories of shifting their mindset, taking courageous action, and designing the life they always wanted to live.
Welcome back to the Live The Width of Your Life podcast. Thank you so much for continuing to tune in every week. My guest this week is Lori Pine, and she's a former corporate VP turned executive coach on a mission to help ambitious professionals find joy so they can create a legacy of fulfillment. And Lori believes that when we find joy, the world transforms and every person in our orbit, our partners, our children, our friends, family, and coworkers reap the many benefits.
Lori worked in corporate for a long time. She worked for three global giants, Anheuser Busch, Coca-Cola company, and Campbell's Soup company. And she was known for leading high-performing, fast-paced teams through change and adversity, spending a lot of her, time focusing on skills like leadership, people development, and sales, and then a pivotal moment in her life happened in which she paused and stepped away from the corporate.
And now she dedicates her work as a coach to helping individuals and companies find pathways to more joyful ways of working and living. I loved our conversation. We talked a lot about not just her experience, but also what we see happening today in the corporate world, what we see happening for males and females, and leadership positions and how it's impacting them personally and professionally. I loved our conversation. Take a listen.
Welcome, Lori, I am so excited to have you on the show today. I've been looking forward to our conversation all week.
[00:02:25] Lori: So glad to be here. Thank you.
[00:02:28] Aneta: Yeah. And it's so funny because even before we hit record, we just talked a little bit and I just said to you, we're just going to be friends. Like you just meet people and you're, this is a connection that was supposed to be made
[00:02:41] Lori: Fast friends.
[00:02:43] Aneta: And so I would love to hear a little bit about your background in the sense that it's important for people to understand what you were doing before you became The Joy CEO coach. And so tell me a little bit about your life before in corporate and then what happened and what led you to where you are today.
[00:03:05] Lori: So I've always been a very ambitious corporate girl. I think I came out of my mother wanting to be a vice president and just to climb the ranks and worked for three really large global brands. Anheuser Busch, the Coca-Cola Company, and Campbell's Soup Company made my way to a vice president leading a large team.
Called on supermarkets as a vice president of sales and loved every minute of it loved leading a team in the day-to-day busyness and ever-changing business environment, getting to meet new people, and getting to experience a fast-paced pace ever-changing environment. And when the pandemic hit, as we all know, who experienced that, it changed in a way that I don't think any of us were prepared for.
But what also changed for me at that time was that I have 2 sons, one was graduating from high school in 2020 and the other was a sophomore in high school and my youngest struggled. And that was something that I don't know that any of us could foresee or could ever have braced ourselves for. And so that change in my family dynamic had me at a crossroads.
And it was that struggle in my child that had me pause and reflect and ultimately resign and leave my position as a senior leader within my organization to pay attention and be home. It was a big shift as you can imagine, but that was the big pivot moment.
[00:04:57] Aneta: Before I ask other questions. How's your son? Is he doing okay?
[00:05:01] Lori: You know, he's amazing. It was quite a transformation. Going into it, he was struggling like, I think so many of our teens were at that time. I'm not sure how many of us are talking openly about it. But his brother had gone off to college and he was just left behind.
And all the while, not knowing how to navigate this whole new world, we had moved him from a large public high school to a small private high school right before the lockdown. So a lot was going on for him and, he did such an amazing 180 once I was just home and available and present.
And you never really know how unavailable you are, how busy you are, how much your mind is preoccupied with work and the to-do list and the distraction of what you need to be available for when you're managing almost a billion-dollar business. Running a large team, but when that's gone and removed from your periphery and your constant thought process, you're like, wow, I have a lot of space to show up and be available to my family and it changed a lot for us.
[00:06:20] Aneta: That's wonderful that he's great and I love that your mama bear kind of kicked in. It's so interesting when we were on this, I don't know, this fast track and, and doing all the things and trying to juggle it all and keep it all afloat. When the things that are most important to us present themselves as a need, it's just not that it is easy. I'm sure it was not easy for you to make this decision, but in some sense, it was like, I know what I need to do. And so what was the response at work when you resigned?
[00:06:54] Lori: so it's interesting. I will add just for anybody who might be listening. I was a single mom for 7 years and then I remarried and I remarried somebody wonderful and supportive and we're a real team and part of what was so difficult for me was to rely on somebody financially. Like to believe that somebody was going to have my financial back and that I actually could step away from my job for a given period, an unknown period, because I had this hustle and this survival mentality because it was all on me to take care of these boys.
And so, there was a real shift. I think I probably transformed as much as my son in that period, it was as much for me. But I was at a crossroads with work. I had been such an overachiever, constantly trying to be the best, not only do the best but be the best and be the top performer.
And back to answering your question. I had monthly on-ones with my boss and you're doing great. Even through this pandemic and all these changing times leading to my decision, I was continually getting such positive feedback and I had this moment. And I think for many of us when we're faced with something like that, we have these very clear defining moments.
My moment was when I asked for a sign like, God, universe, I need a sign. Can you please give me a sign? And I looked probably like a crazy person in my front yard out there talking to god. And I'm like, could you please just give me a sign one so obvious that I won't be able to miss it so that I know exactly what to do?
Stay, go be with my son, and because it was a difficult decision not only are you giving up a salary, but my identity and my day-to-day and what was the right thing and it wasn't. But maybe a week later, I was in my normal 1 on 1 with my boss and he said, you're no longer meeting the competencies of the role. And nothing had changed. It was just my sign.
And let me tell you, that didn't go over well for me. It took a long time for me to come to acceptance with that, but it was my sign. It was the sign I had asked for, and it has turned out to be the greatest gift. I had to come to terms with it. My ego had to come to some terms with it, but amazing.
[00:09:47] Aneta: Isn't it amazing when we ask for the signs and then we pay attention? You maybe were like, I expected it to come through a different way. But do you feel like this is exactly what you needed to say, okay, I can walk away now.
[00:10:00] Lori: Yes. And it set me up in a way that I didn't just resign and have to walk away. I was able to resign and receive a severance package and there were blessings in it. Yes,
[00:10:14] Aneta: So what did it feel like for you? Maybe a couple of days, weeks, months, I don't know how long it took for you. I call it like the detox from the pace, the environment from corporate because it does feel almost like a hangover, like this cortisol hangover, as you're detoxing from all these things, did you experience that and how long did it take for you to start to feel clear, healthy, focused, whatever it was that you were feeling after you left?
[00:10:46] Lori: So that's a fantastic question. I expected it to take a month or 2, but honestly, it took over a year. And I was a little impatient with myself. I kept expecting like, okay, today's the day I'm going to be ready to just go charge at the world, but I wasn't ready. And those first few days, those very first few days, I didn't even know what to do with myself.
[00:11:15] Aneta: Because your calendar was wide open. There are no meetings on it.
[00:11:19] Lori: No meetings. I no longer had a laptop. I had to go buy a laptop. I didn't even have one anymore. I turned it in. And my son went to school. My husband went to work. My other son was at college and there was me. And the dogs. So I found myself that first week, I think I went to the grocery store like three times a day and stopped at the dry cleaners. I didn't know what to do with myself.
I'd walk the dogs, so it took some time to be clear. Now, the one thing that I had done that was, such a gift, really a gift, somewhere intuitively, somewhere God spoke to me, was I left in April and in February I hired a coach of my own. And this coach walked me through. Not only how to leave, but how to kind of restore myself.
And we did some work on dreams and purpose. Stuff I hadn't even thought about it. None of that occurred to me. Because when you're in the hustle and the grind, dreams don't occur to you. No, there's no time for any of that. So what I did for that next year was start to lay out, what are my passions. What is the type of legacy I'd like to leave?
As I start to think about this next chapter of work. Am I going back into a corporate job or am I starting to create something new? And as I started to map that out, I became very passionate about giving back and helping other women.
I thought about women who might be sitting in a corner office right now, just sobbing or crying because they were carrying some heavy burden and then wiping their tears and going into a big meeting to present and just shoving all that down in, and that was what drove me.
[00:13:28] Aneta: So incredible. And I love that you talked about hiring a coach because it is hard to shift from that very masculine energy of drive and hustle and get things done and go as fast as you can and just to do all the work that it takes to be successful. And then say, and now let's vision. Let's dream. Let's ask yourself, what do you want to do?
It's one, we don't have practice at it. So it feels completely new and foreign, but two, it is helpful to have someone guide you. So you said when you started, you weren't sure if you were going to switch industries or go back to corporate or what you were going to do. But how did you decide that you were going to start your own business tell us a little bit more about that process.
[00:14:16] Lori: So she took me through this exercise. That was a walk through my history, things I had done in my childhood, things I had done through high school, college, and into the early days of my career and what was the breadcrumb trail that became consistent and illuminated my history.
And what was continually consistent was that I was a member of a team. I played sports, I mentored and I led. And when I started to put all of that together and kind of mind-mapped it, if you will, it looked like coaching would be a great career. As I started to put that against what I wanted in my personal life at this point in my life, which was time freedom, geographic freedom, and financial freedom, I could make a business out of coaching. And have those three things and have an impact because the word impact kept coming up again and again and again impact.
And so this Venn diagram, if you will, came up and coaching was at the epicenter. So I signed up for a course at Rutgers. They have this executive leadership coaching for organizational performance. And I loved it. I met amazing people in the course. It was a six-month certification program. And that was it. I started coaching. In the beginning, I was like, can I coach you just for free, just to see how I do with this? And, I had some takers and I loved it. So here we are.
[00:16:12] Aneta: Do you mostly coach women?
[00:16:14] Lori: I mostly coach women. I do have a few men. I think that the men are struggling as well. They are burdened with worry and responsibility. And the men, not only that I coached, but the men that I have managed find it difficult to share that burden with their partners, their wives because they don't want to worry them.
So they keep that all on themselves. And what ends up happening is it manifests into health issues, heart issues mostly heart issues and hypertension issues, and they struggle. So they need a place too, the men need a place too.
[00:16:59] Aneta: They do. That's so true. So your passion I know is working with women. One of the things that you and I talked about is you and I both left and we decided to become coaches and start our businesses and continue to help women. But I am concerned at the rate that which women are leaving organizations, especially women in their forties, and fifties.
Because I believe that these organizations need female leadership. I think we need diverse leadership. I think we need all those experiences. So what can we do to help the women, but allow them to stay where they are? Because I know not everyone wants to leave and it's not the proper solution for everyone to leave corporate because I think we still need women.
So have you worked with your clients to get them to what they need to do to be able to stay and to grow in their leadership and then help influence their teams or their cultures to influence the impact that they make in the organizations?
[00:18:00] Lori: Yes, it's such an important question that I think all should be asking ourselves is this very question. My take on it is there's got to be at least a two-pronged approach. We have to start with the women so that they are learning to take care of themselves. Many of the women that I know who get to the vice president and beyond level have a really hard time with balance and self-care.
So they go at a hundred and 150 miles an hour. They're at the beck and call of their organization. And with that comes a lot of guilt. If I'm here, I'm just terrible. But if I'm here, I'm terrible too. And so it's this constant battle within of how to show up who to be.
But the truth is we're never just the corporate version of ourselves or the motherly, wifely, or female version of ourselves. We're one body, one person. And so how do we show up as our whole self and bring our whole self with us to the best of our ability on any given day or any given meeting, and be true to that?
So learning skills, learning boundaries, learning to say no, learning to prioritize, learning what's really in our greatest and highest interest, our best interest, and having clarity around that because not everything can be the most important thing. And a lot of the clients I work with have a laundry list of 50 things that are their most important things.
No, we got to get that down to five. Five things can only be your most important things. And so clarity is one of the greatest gifts that you can have. But I, for myself, can't have clarity on my own. I need somebody to help me with clarity because otherwise, I'm just piling on a to-do list. That's impossible.
The second part of that is we have to have organizations that value flexibility because women need flexibility and value experience. I went through more than 12 reorgs in my career. It was like clockwork every two years, there was a reorg coming down. And I feel like it came from the whole Jack Welch jam era. And that management era, I believe is getting to be outdated. People are tired.
[00:20:33] Aneta: Oh, for sure. I hope so.
[00:20:35] Lori: Of the constant reorg. Yes. And while I understand that we're going to get rid of the not-performing bottom and keep the top-performing top and cut some waste I understand that. But we're not protecting our most valuable asset, which is the human capital asset, and we're not protecting our women.
And what's happening is women are the shrapnel and all of this and they're tired. And they're saying, I'm just not going to do this anymore. I'm tired of this. I'm tired of restarting jobs, taking on more work being a casualty every two years, having to find a new job, being let go from an organization, and starting this rollercoaster all over.
And then at the age of say 45 or 50 being told, well, I'm not valuable anymore. When the truth is. We're living to a hundred now, so we're only halfway there. So we still have tremendous value.
[00:21:37] Aneta: Of course. Yeah. It's so interesting your observations because I've seen the same thing too I spent 22 years in banking and the reorgs happened all the time and it was the same cycle and what I've read in so many interesting reports, especially lean ins done someone women quietly leaving, but just the observation that I had is a younger female leader. I saw women reach the age, maybe close to 50 where suddenly their positions were eliminated or they were gone.
And these were high performers. These are people that younger women look up to. These are people, women who had a voice and were using their voice to try to influence change, and suddenly they were gone. And I remember it was just one of those things was like, note to self, okay, pay attention. And see if this is a trend, pay attention to see what's happening. And it did influence my decision to leave as well. Because I thought, well, there's not going to be a long-term career here anyway, so I might as well create this for myself, but I don't think that's the answer.
I think that we need women. We need female leaders. We need their voice. We need diversity. And that's just women. Of course, diversity across the board. So what are some of the challenges? When you're coaching these women and they're choosing to influence and show up authentically as themselves, as you said, and that highest version of them, what are still some of the challenges that they're encountering that they're sharing with you?
[00:23:07] Lori: Well, not everybody wants to hear it,
[00:23:10] Aneta: Yeah.
[00:23:11] Lori: So in fact, I have one client who reports to a CEO in the banking industry and her CEO does not want to hear it and it's gotten to a point where his lack of emotional intelligence. So she's got choices, does she stay and continue to try to make a difference in the organization or does she start to realize that her talents have outgrown the organization and look outside the organization?
Those are decisions she'll have to make for herself. That's what happens when we start to realize our potential and then look around, the risk is we outgrow where we're at and sometimes that's okay.
[00:24:03] Aneta: Yeah. Sometimes it needs to happen. Like the moment you had, and we all have those moments when we decide what about the men, you mentioned also have burdens. They also have worries. They also have thoughts and they're suppressing them. And we know that when we do that, it can turn into disease. It can turn into some chronic illness and different things too. So What can they be doing to help be allies or for them to show up as their authentic self at work and maybe also be able to influence some change.
[00:24:35] Lori: Yeah. So I have this one particular client and he was just unaware of how all of that suppression was turning into anger, he just didn't know. And so we started with what would it look like if you openly and honestly shared with somebody. What you were feeling, what was happening for you and who would that person be?
And so he chose his wife and over the course of about three months, I can't even explain to you what happened with his relationship with his wife, because as you can imagine, as a wife, she's been worried. She's been scared. She's been seeing behaviors that are concerning, but she didn't know the backstory.
So, like these miracles start happening in his marriage, which then alleviate some of the burden, which then turns into conversations. He and I could start having about, okay, how do you take this into work? How do you start having emotionally intelligent conversations at work and seeing a bigger picture for your team, allowing some infractions.
If somebody's five minutes late because they had to drop somebody off at daycare or, somebody was throwing up this morning. Like, how do you start to have some grace around the human aspects of running a team? And, he would go around with like his fists so wound up so tight, like with the stress.
And before you know it, he's relaxing, his shoulders are dropping a little bit and that's just like the goal we had co partnered and like, how do we drop those shoulders just a little bit and life's just getting a little bit better for him. He has scheduled a vacation.
[00:26:43] Aneta: Wow, hopefully he doesn't bring his laptop
[00:26:48] Lori: We're working on that, but, even if he did a vacation is an improvement. So, yeah.
[00:26:55] Aneta: No. It's so good. So you mentioned a little bit about self-care and this is for men and women, the need to take care of themselves to create some more balance and to give themselves more one to create the awareness of like, what is it that I need? How am I feeling? But then what are the things I can do for myself? So what are some of the practices or routines that you coach your clients on and things that maybe have even worked for you?
[00:27:21] Lori: So one, it starts with our thinking when you're highly ambitious, going to hustle, going to be the best type of personality. Sometimes your thinking in this department can backfire on you because you're thinking when it comes to self-care is, I don't have an hour to do that. I don't have the time to put on my sneakers, put on a sports bra, or go get a full-on sweat.
So therefore I'm just not going to do it. I'm just going to stay at my desk and keep on grinding and hustling through. So I try with my clients to say, okay, we're going to take that level of thinking and we're just going to put that over on the side. How about we just start with five minutes? Five minutes, walk around the block down the street, and back. Just start with that. Just get up from your desk.
Five minutes, go up to the bathroom and put on your favorite lipstick. You're going to feel better on a zoom meeting if you have on your favorite lipstick than if you don't. Moments of joy that are just going to make you feel better about yourself that nobody else can do, but you.
And start to just infuse a little bit of sunshine into what it is that you're doing in your day. I created this freebie on my website it's the ultimate joy guide and it gives some of these little tips. It's simple. It's not rocket science but just a way to remind you that you can infuse joy back into your every day
[00:29:03] Aneta: I love that. I think it's also funny that we need a guide to teach people how to experience joy, but it's so true because when I talk to my clients about joy, I get two responses or maybe a couple of responses. One is like, I don't understand what's joy and how's it different than happiness or what is it to yeah, if I just fix all these other areas of my life, then I will be more joyful, which is not necessarily how it works. Or there's like people don't experience it like they're just gray. They've sort of gotten to a place where nothing is in color and it's so sad. So how do you define joy? Because I would love to see if yours aligns with mine. Because I don't think it's the same thing as happy. So how do you define joy?
[00:29:50] Lori: I think joy comes from within and you can access it at any moment, no matter what's going on around you. The kids can be screaming, you can be mad at your husband, work can be falling apart, and yet you can still access joy because it comes from within you, and it's a choice you can make.
[00:30:14] Aneta: I agree. It's a state of being. And I do love that you mentioned that it could be little things too. I asked my clients to create a joy list. Like something or a basket of joy, things that they can pull from that if they need it, like their favorite mug or cozy blanket nearby or making sure they have time to go for a walk or whatever it is, or like you said, putting on your favorite lipstick.
It doesn't have to be big things. It doesn't have to be like a huge ceremony. It doesn't have to be so grand. It is in the small things. It's finding those things that bring you a smile that make you feel more joyful or appreciative of life or grateful or whatever it is. So what are some of the things that are on your joy list? What are some of the things you do for yourself that just evoke more joy?
[00:31:04] Lori: So, I have these 2 dogs. They bring me joy for sure. I have a favorite lipstick that when I'm like, God this is just a miserable sort of day. I just pull that lipstick out. I have a Spotify playlist it's a hype, Beyonce's on there. Taylor's on there, it's like, okay, state of mind. Like we are going for this.
[00:31:27] Aneta: Share that with me. I need one of those.
[00:31:29] Lori: I will. And sometimes just moving my body will bring me some joy. I tend to have this mentality of hustle and grind. Come on, Lori, just sit at this desk and just grind this stuff out. But if I get up from this chair and start walking, there's something about being outside and breathing in all of this gorgeousness that's been created for us that just will change my attitude, like just snap me right around. Yeah.
[00:32:03] Aneta: So good. It's just those little things. Do you ever catch yourself thinking back to when you were working with your coach, kind of creating the vision, focusing in on the dreams, thinking about the business or the life that you could create financial freedom of time, geographic freedom, and looking at your life now, do you just have those moments where you pinch yourself and say, I'm doing it. Like it's here,
[00:32:30] Lori: Yes. So as we speak, I am In San Diego in a hotel room, overlooking the ocean, and having a podcast with you. I mean, that didn't happen in my previous life. So yeah, here I am making it all come true. I signed a new client this week while I was here in San Diego. It's just, it's amazing. And I'm doing work that I love and I feel like makes a difference.
[00:33:01] Aneta: Yeah. So good. And tell me, is there anything else that you're currently working on that you're excited about?
[00:33:08] Lori: So I'm excited. I have launched my first retreat, which has been a dream. I would sit in my corporate life and say, I'm going to host a retreat for 1 day with a group of amazing women. I'm going to bring them all together and fast forward here I am doing it. I'm going to take a group of 10 women to Canyon Ranch in the Berkshires Lenox, Massachusetts in October. I have three spots left open and my goal is to rejuvenate these women, pamper these women, and help them just come back to life with a renewed spirit of joy and purpose. And I'm excited about it.
[00:33:52] Aneta: Sounds heavenly. So if people want to work with you or maybe even learn more about this retreat, where can they find you?
[00:34:00] Lori: So loripine.com is my website and @loripine is my Instagram handle. And I would love to. Be in touch with any of your listeners.
[00:34:12] Aneta: So good. And I ask all of my guests a final question tied to the title of the podcast, which is what does it mean to you to live the width of your life?
[00:34:23] Lori: For me, it means finding that joy and spreading it, making that impact, because I believe that's why I'm here.
[00:34:33] Aneta: So good. Lori, thank you so much. Thanks for being a bright light in this world. I just applaud your courage to go after the dream that you wanted for your life and you're doing it, helping others, being of service, spreading love much continued success to you.
[00:34:48] Lori: Thank you so much for having me. It was a pleasure.
[00:34:51] Aneta: Thank you for listening to today's episode. If today's conversation inspired you to dream again, break out of your comfort zones or reflect on what it means to you to live more fully, then please follow this podcast because every week you'll hear more stories from people just like you who took imperfect action towards their goals, created more joy and are living the life that they always dreamt of living.